Champion of the World (37 page)

Moira held Carol Jean's hand so tightly, both their knuckles went white. “You've suffered a great loss,” she said. “We just can't imagine.”

Carol Jean's eyes grew wild and she looked around like she didn't know where she was. A few strands of her hair had come loose from their tie, reminding Pepper of an animal, of a bag lady on the street. “Where will I go?” she said. “How will I live?”

Moira smiled, a look he'd seen her use to calm men who'd lost their fortunes at the poker table. “You'll come with us to New York, of course,” she said. “They already have a room for you at the Plaza Hotel. You'll stay with us there and we'll all figure it out as we go.”

“They'll cancel the event now,” Carol Jean said. “They must. Do you think Mr. Mundt would loan me some money? To help me get on my feet, I mean?”

“You could ask him,” Pepper said. “But I doubt it.”

His anger had wilted and now he felt heavy and sad for her all over again. It seemed as though her mind couldn't stay focused on one thing. She was jumping from trouble to trouble, like she couldn't decide where to start. It was hard to watch. He unbuttoned his jacket and was going to sit down, but Moira looked at him in a way that said,
Don't you dare.
He left them like that, sitting side by side on the seat. He went back into the hallway and headed for the observation deck again, a little guilty at the delight he felt to be free.

W
hen they arrived in New York, he sent Moira and Carol Jean ahead to the hotel, while he and Fritz stayed behind to deal with Public Health. It seemed to take forever even though there really wasn't much to be done. A couple of cops came on the train and asked some questions while Pepper and Fritz signed their names to the necessary forms. Then a team of white-jacketed men who never introduced themselves came and took Taft away on a stretcher, covering him with a sheet so that he looked like some massive piece
of cargo. One of the cops asked about next of kin and Pepper gave them Carol Jean's name. He hoped that Moira was able to keep her away from the reporters and, if not, that they were going easy on her.

It was well after dark by the time their cab let them off in front of the Plaza. Despite the cold, the sidewalks were busy with couples out for a stroll in the park. A few of the great horse-drawn tour wagons were still running, and Pepper saw smiling, rosy-faced people bundled up in blankets riding in them, waving to the folks on the sidewalk as they clip-clopped past.

Fritz went straight through the crowd into the lobby, his head down, not looking around. They stood in line at the front desk, got their room keys and took the stairs up, parting ways in the upstairs hall without saying a word. Moira was already there when he let himself into their room. She was under the covers of the big hotel bed but was still awake, the bedside lamp the only light burning.

He asked her how Carol Jean was doing and Moira just shook her head. He stretched out next to her and she switched off the light. He closed his eyes and wondered how long it would be before they came for him. He knew Fritz would go straight up to talk with Stettler and Lesko. O'Shea, too, if he was in town.

“What are you going to tell them?” Moira said in the dark. Her voice sounded thin and hollow. Of course, she'd figured it out, too.

“I don't know,” he said. “But I'm looking forward to watching them squirm.”

He hadn't expected to like Taft, but in the end he had. Now that the man was dead, he was sorry for it, but also felt as though it brought a kind of clarity to things. For the first time in a long time, he felt like he was ahead of the game. He knew with absolute certainty what would happen when they came. He knew what he would say to them and what the looks on their faces would be when he said it. He was looking forward to it.

T
he knock came after one in the morning and he cracked the door to find Fritz standing in the hallway, looking grim and bloodshot in a vest and shirtsleeves. They climbed the stairs up to the penthouse level, the entire hotel sleeping around them, the railing creaking under their weight. Fritz leaned on it especially hard, it seemed to Pepper, like a man twice his age.

“I thought you'd be happier to see me,” he said as they went out into the top-floor hallway. “Considering I'm about drag your ass out of the fire.”

“We'll see about that,” Fritz said.

It was the biggest hotel room Pepper had ever seen, and it was terribly bright for the time of night. Stettler, Lesko and O'Shea were all there, all of them looking tired and edgy. Stettler offered him a drink.

“Make it a double,” Pepper said, grinning at Lesko as they all gathered in a sitting area surrounded by doors to other, unseen rooms.

Of the three, O'Shea seemed to be the one most saddened by Taft's death. The circumstances of the illness were especially troubling to him.

“You wouldn't know it to look at him,” O'Shea complained. “He was such a big fellow. Stout.”

“No,” Pepper said, trying and failing to catch Fritz's eye. “Who could've known?”

Fritz was the one who laid it out for him. Tickets for the match had already sold out and they were up against it, having paid the building fee and sold advertising inside the arena and done weeks of press and promotion. Taft's death was tragic, he said, but at this point they couldn't afford a cancellation. It would ruin them all from a promotional standpoint, not to mention the financial hit.
They'd talked about it at length and kept coming back to the same conclusion.

“With consideration to public interest and the press coverage we're expecting, there's only one attraction that won't result in heavy refunds and won't make us a laughingstock in the papers,” Fritz said. “We want you to step in for Taft and wrestle Lesko for the world's heavyweight championship.”

Pepper took a slow drink of scotch and savored the feeling, waiting for the silence to get a little uncomfortable before he answered.

“I know you do,” he finally said.

“And?” Fritz said.

“And,” he said, “if you think for one minute that I'm going to go out there in front of ten thousand people and lie down for this sorry sack of shit, you can all go fuck yourselves. I threw a match once for you bastards and it damn near ruined my life. I won't do it again. Any deal you had with Taft died with him. The real tragedy in all of this is that he was never going to get a level chance to go out and whip Lesko in front of the whole world. If I owe that man's memory anything, as imperfect as he was, it certainly won't be served by me taking a dive. That's never going to happen, so just forget it. Do I make myself clear?”

This outburst did not have the effect he had planned. He expected them to get mad, maybe just throw him out right then and there. Instead, Stettler and O'Shea looked amused, while Fritz stared at a spot on the carpet a few inches in front of his own feet. Pepper wasn't sure Lesko moved at all.

“He's a presumptuous little fellow,” O'Shea said. “I admire his fire.”

Stettler smiled what looked like his most patient smile. “I think you may have jumped to an unfortunate conclusion here, Pepper,” he said. “The truth is, we talked it over and we all agree that we'd like you to win.”

T
he three of them sat across from him, looking pleased with themselves. Only Lesko's expression hadn't changed. The heavyweight champion just folded his arms, unfolded them, and then stood up to fix himself a drink. Pepper followed him with his eyes, feeling a flash of irritation at the thought they might be having him on. He hadn't figured on this.

“Are you serious?” he said.

“Think of it,” Fritz said. “The former lightweight champion of the world, outweighed by nearly one hundred pounds, comes out of retirement and wins the heavyweight title. It's the perfect underdog story.”

Pepper reminded himself to go slowly, to think. He nodded at Lesko. “What about you?” he said. “Are you ready to sign off on the perfect underdog story?”

Lesko's eyes focused on the wall behind his head. “Whatever Billy says,” he said. “So long as my money's right.”

Pepper wished he'd woken Moira when Fritz had come to get him, wished she was with him now. He'd thought he had their scheme figured out, but now they'd re-schemed it on him. He sneered at Lesko. “Whatever Billy says,” he repeated. Then back to Stettler: “I don't get it. No one would willingly give up the world's
heavyweight championship. It's like a license to print your own money. What's the angle here?”

“We've already got a capacity crowd paid in the hopes of seeing Taft get a beating from Lesko,” Stettler said. “With you in the mix, it'll be the exact opposite. People will want to see if you can
win
. When you do, they'll go absolutely nuts for it. We'll make a mint on the rematch.”

“Whoa, hold on,” Pepper said. “Don't I have to sign off on the first one before we start talking about the rematch?”

Fritz tried out a little laugh. “Don't be rash,” he said. “We're talking about big money here.”

“If you won't do it, somebody else will,” Stettler shrugged. “We've already rented the Newcastle Ballroom next month in Philadelphia. No matter what you decide, Lesko loses the title this weekend and wins it back then.”

Pepper put his hands up. “You're going to have to back up and explain what's going on,” he said. “Remember, I'm just a dumb wrestler. I'm over my head with all you geniuses.”

The three promoters passed a glance as slowly as if it were a flask of liquor, and Lesko found something interesting to look at in the bottom of his drink.

“Tell him,” O'Shea said finally.

A queasy feeling crept into his belly. “Tell me what?” he said.

“Listen,” Stettler said, his seat groaning as he shifted. “What we're talking about here is a whole new kind of wrestling show. Fritz, Stan and me, we're putting together a team of talented men who can travel the country together performing nightly”—he searched the ceiling for the right word—“
exhibitions
, from town to town. No more one-off bouts that take months to put together. Our men would each work a whole program of bouts together. Two wrestlers—say, you and Lesko—could perform in Philadelphia one night, New York the next, New Jersey the night after that.”

“Like a traveling carnival troupe,” Fritz added. They all looked at Pepper as if he were a man on a high wire. Waiting to see if he would make it to the next platform, or if he might teeter off and fall. “What do you say?”

“I say it's the stupidest thing I ever heard,” he said. “When you say exhibitions, you mean fixes, right? You mean business matches.” As he said it, the enormity of what they were suggesting spread out in front of him. Here he was sitting in a room with four of the most powerful men in wrestling and they were talking about turning the whole sport into a sideshow. He could scarcely believe it. He looked at Fritz but saw no shame in his big cow eyes, his bald head bobbing right along with Stettler. “That's ludicrous,” he said. “Fans will smell the fix a mile off. They won't stand for it.”

“Some people might be wise to it,” Stettler said, “but they won't care. These working stiffs just want an excuse to get out of the house for an evening. We'll give them the whole shebang—the drama, the excitement—it'll be like moving pictures come to life.”

“What about the other promoters?” Pepper said. “They'll make a mockery of you in the papers.”

“Dinosaurs,” Stettler said. “With O'Shea backing us, we own the papers. Same with the politicians. You won't see any of our boys dragged through the mud or brought up on fraud charges, that's a promise. Plus, we have Lesko. If anybody gets frisky and refuses to do business, he'll whip them on the square. Inside of a year or two we'll be the only game in town. Anybody who doesn't go along will be out. Mark my words.”

“You can't be serious,” Pepper said. “You'll kill us. You'll sink the whole thing.”

Stettler snorted. “Do you have any idea what's happened to the wrestling business since you've been away?” he said. “While you spent the last five years traveling around with your little carnival act,
the rest of us have been trying to save it. The whole thing is in the toilet. Nobody cares about it anymore.”

“Because Gotch retired,” Pepper said. “People loved Gotch. It happens. Business slacks off for a bit, but it always comes back up.”

“This time there's no coming back,” Stettler said.

“Nobody wants to watch two guys pulling on each other for a three-hour match,” Fritz said. “They want to drink some suds, see a slam-bang show, and still get home at a reasonable hour.”

“Bullshit,” Pepper said. “Scientific wrestling is a huge drawing card.”

“We're living in a new era,” Stettler said. “The sooner you make peace with it, the easier it'll be on you.”

“You said yourself we've already got a sellout for tomorrow night,” Pepper said. “You'll probably draw close to two hundred thousand dollars at the gate.”

“Maybe,” Stettler said, “but only because it's a curiosity. Lesko versus Taft was a freak-show act from the beginning. People wanted to see something unique, and that's exactly what we'll give them with our new show. It'll be better than the real thing. It'll be
bigger
than the real thing. Hell, it'll be bigger than baseball.”

Stettler seemed to swell as he became the center of attention, and now he was practically bursting with pride. His eyes were bright, and it occurred to Pepper that he really was a hell of a promoter. Still, he waved them away. “Fuck that,” he said. “I'm not doing it.”

Their heads dipped. This was starting to become a very tiresome experience for them, he could tell. It was late and none of them looked like they'd slept.

“You will so do it,” Fritz said.

“You'll do it for the money,” Stettler said. “If you join up with us you stand to make upwards of fifty thousand dollars a year. That's a damn spot better than the twenty-five dollars a week you were
making as a carnival freak. You'll do it because your other option is to sit there and make your little jokes while the rest of us drag this business out of the past and put it back in the big theaters. Deep down, the last thing you want is to be left out of that, am I right?”

“Besides,” O'Shea said, “let's not act like you haven't done this before. You're getting a better deal from us than you got last time.”

Their eyes were hard, but there was something fragile in them, too. It was more than just fatigue. It was desperation. They needed him to do this. They had to get him to take this deal or their whole plan would go under. They would be out the building deposit and end up refunding thousands to people who'd already bought tickets. For maybe the first time in his life, the men in charge needed him more than he needed them, and he savored for a moment the feeling of being the thorn in the lion's paw. He was going to let them dangle for as long as he could before he told them to go fuck themselves. Really, what could they do? Kill him? He supposed they could try. He could roll the dice, walk out of this room, and let them come for him if that's what they decided. First they'd have to catch him.

He was considering all this when Lesko spoke, his low rumbling voice flat and forceful in the quiet room. “He'll do it,” he said, “but not for the money. That's not why.”

Pepper crooked an eyebrow and beckoned for him to get on with it. “Oh?” he said. This, at least, was interesting.

“Make no mistake, you will do it,” Lesko said. “From the moment you walked in here with that stupid, self-satisfied grin on your face there wasn't a chance in the world you were going to turn this offer down.”

Pepper crossed his legs, ankle on knee. “How can you be so sure?” he said.

“You know how many men I've met just like you?” Lesko said. “How many Wild West cowboys with more guts than brains have tried to test me? A hundred. Hell, a thousand. I know that
somewhere in the back of that pea brain of yours there's a fantasy that you can beat me. You're gonna walk out that door and leave your chance lying on the table? No way.”

He was right, but Pepper didn't want to give him the satisfaction. He said: “We won't learn a thing if the fix is on.”

Lesko shook his head, dismissive. “It'll be enough,” he said. “I'll give you a taste of what I could do to you and you'll know straightaway. Never in a million years, little man, would you have a chance against me on the level. A million fucking years.”

Pepper's shirt suddenly felt tight across his back and he willed himself to relax. He wondered if they'd put Lesko up to this, if this had been their plan all along: to have the promoters show a little leg and then get the champion to swoop in to close the deal. He fought hard not to let his expression crack when he spoke again. “I'm going to go real slow now, so that even the big ox can understand,” he said. “I'm not wrestling a business match. I won't do it. Not for you, not for anybody. Call me old-fashioned, but I liked it better when the two guys in the ring got to decide who won and who lost. You remember that, you assholes? The two guys out there sweating and bleeding and pouring their guts out? You want me in on this thing, there's only one way to do it.”

The only thing that moved in the room were Lesko's eyes as he looked at Stettler. “I can beat him, Billy,” he said. “That's not a problem.”

“Absolutely not,” Stettler said. “Aside from the gate, Mr. O'Shea and I have substantial gambling interests at stake here. Sending you out there for a prick-measuring contest puts all of that at risk.”

A coaster stuck to the bottom of O'Shea's drink as he lifted it from the table. He plucked it off with a little pop, a lazy grin uncoiling on his face. “Don't do anything on my account,” he said. “If the principals insist on a legitimate confrontation, well, it might be worth it to me just to watch.”

Stettler stared at him as if he couldn't believe it. He said the gangster's name, but O'Shea didn't look at him, just continued fiddling with the coaster as he set it back on the table. Stettler turned back to Lesko, who hadn't budged. Finally he fluttered both his hands in the air, a womanly gesture. “Sure,” he said. “Why not just chuck months of planning at the last moment. It looks like I'm outvoted again. Congratulations, Mr. Van Dean, you've just inherited the beating of a lifetime.”

“I want a hundred thousand dollars,” Pepper said. “I want it in cash before the match, and that's just for the weekend. We'll talk about Philadelphia after.”

“Fifty,” said Stettler. “Don't push it.”

“Fine,” Pepper said. “If I find out you're trying to fuck me, you'll be sorry. If I even think I smell a double cross, your little partnership won't make it out of New York in one piece.”

O'Shea grinned. “I've always enjoyed you,” he said. “Never a dull moment.”

They had the contracts already drawn up and laid out on the small table in the adjoining dining room. Pepper watched over their shoulders and Stettler and Fritz changed the terms of his compensation from the thirty thousand they'd previously promised Taft to fifty thousand. O'Shea produced a pen from his jacket and Pepper signed, then stood back while the heavyweight champion applied his own wide, looping signature.

“You,” Pepper said, as Lesko turned away, going back to the sideboard and discarding his empty glass. “You've got yours coming.”

Lesko didn't look back as he walked out of the room, closing the door to a connecting suite quietly behind him. Pepper stared at the door until Stettler broke the spell by saying someone would have to alert the press.